This "post" is a work in progress. This rough draft will hopefully be finalized at a later date. Thank you to Perplexity for your help with the research and also forming my thoughts into this first draft.

The Heart: The Port of Value, Importance, and Our Highest Aims

Throughout history, the "heart" has been more than a biological organ; it's the ancient and enduring symbol of our value center—the place from which our deepest desires, highest aims, and most important decisions flow. In every culture, the heart represents what we treasure most, what we are willing to pursue at great cost, and what ultimately shapes our lives.

The Heart as the Center of Value—and the Reality of Limits

In the ancient world, the heart was seen as the core of a person’s being—the source of thought, intention, and desire. To “set your heart” on something was to orient your entire life around it. Even today, we use phrases like “put your heart into it” and “follow your heart” to express what we value most.

But at the core of this idea is a fundamental reality: limits. Just as a port has limited capacity for ships and goods, our hearts and lives have limited capacity for values, commitments, and pursuits. We cannot value everything equally, nor can we import every possible influence or desire into our hearts. Limits force us to choose, and those choices reveal what we truly love.

What Does "Important" Really Mean? Importing from Abroad

Let’s reclaim the word “important” by returning to its roots. The word "important" comes from the Latin importare, meaning "to carry in," and more specifically, "to bring in from abroad." In its original sense, an "import" referred to goods brought into a country from another. This etymology gives us a powerful way to understand what makes something truly important: it's something so valuable that it's worth the effort and cost to bring it in from a distant, perhaps more valuable, source. So, important things are those that are “expensive and valuable imports”—values, priorities, or pursuits we deliberately allow into the port of our hearts because they are worth the cost.

Working Definition:

Important: An expensive and valuable import—something so worthy that we are willing to pay a high price to bring it into our lives and hearts.

This price is only meaningful because our resources are limited. If we could import everything, nothing would be important. As Andy Stanley wisely puts it, “If everything is important, nothing is important.” Limits create the need for discernment and prioritization, forcing us to decide which "imports from abroad" truly merit a place in our hearts.

The Currencies of Life: The Four Core Resources

How do we know what we truly value? We look at what we are willing to spend. In fact, our language reflects this connection between value and cost:

• We spend time with loved ones.

• We pay attention to what matters.

• We spend money on what we desire.

• We spend energy on our passions.

These are not just casual phrases—they reveal a deep truth about how humans assign value. The resources we spend are finite, and what we choose to spend them on shows what we value most. These are the Four Core resources that determine value in our hearts:

• Time – Our most irreplaceable resource.

• Money – The currency of exchange and investment.

• Energy – The effort and vitality we bring to life.

• Attention – The focus we give to people, ideas, and pursuits.

Think of these as the currencies of life. Every day, you make countless transactions—spending your Four Core resources on people, projects, and priorities. Your spending patterns reveal your true values, regardless of what you say you value.

Giving, Not Just Spending: The Power of Intentional Allocation

While we often speak of "spending" our Four Core resources, there's another way to frame this reality: these currencies are what we give. In a world constantly vying for our attention, energy, time, and money, the question becomes not just what we spend these currencies on, but who or what we give them to.

Our modern environment is designed to extract these currencies from us with minimal resistance. Your phone doesn't just ask for your attention—it demands it through notifications, alerts, and carefully designed interfaces. Billboards don't request a moment of your focus—they interrupt it. Websites don't merely invite your time—they're engineered to consume as much of it as possible. Consider the start of a workday: opening a computer can unleash a flood of emails and notifications, each demanding immediate attention. Without a clear intention, it's easy to give away our most productive hours to tasks that aren't the most important "imports" for our day.

This perspective shift—from spending to giving—can be transformative. When you open your computer in the morning, which tabs will you give your attention to first? When you begin your day, which people will you give your energy to? When you plan your week, which activities will you give your time to? These aren't passive transactions but active gifts—deliberate "imports"—that shape both your life and the lives of others.

Because these currencies are limited, the act of giving them becomes sacred. Each moment of attention given to one thing is attention not given to another. Each dollar given to one purpose is a dollar not given to another. This isn't about guilt or scarcity thinking—it's about the power of intentional allocation, ensuring our "imports" are truly valuable. By consciously choosing where to give your Four Core currencies, you reclaim agency in a world designed to decide for you.

This raises a crucial question: If these are gifts I'm giving, what am I receiving in return?

The Pursuit of Reward: What Are We Really After?

Why do we spend—or give—our Four Core resources? At the root, it’s always about seeking a reward. We sacrifice what we have now in hopes of gaining something we desire in return. This is most obvious with money, but it’s true for time, energy, and attention as well.

• We don’t buy food just to have food; we buy it for the reward of energy, pleasure, or nourishment.

• We buy tools not for the tool itself, but for the reward of making a job easier.

• We spend time with friends for the reward of connection and joy.

• We pour attention into a project for the reward of accomplishment or recognition.

Jesus, in his most famous collection of teachings—the Sermon on the Mount—brilliantly addresses this universal pursuit of reward. He warns that some rewards are fleeting, while others are lasting. He says, “Where your stored wealth is, there your heart will be also.” In other words, what you value, what you "import" and vault in your heart, is revealed by where you invest your resources and what reward you seek.

The Four Ps: The Common Rewards We Chase

Most of us spend our life’s currencies pursuing one or more of these four rewards:

• Pleasure (Comfort): The pursuit of feeling good, ease, or escape.

• Plenty (Coins): The pursuit of acquiring more—money, possessions, or abundance.

• Power (Control): The pursuit of influence, autonomy, or the ability to shape outcomes.

• Prestige/Pride (Claps): The pursuit of applause from others (prestige) or self-approval (pride).

None of these are inherently bad. Pleasure, plenty, power, and prestige can all be good in balance. But if they become our highest aim—if we spend our Four Core resources primarily on these rewards—they can crowd out what truly lasts and lead to regret. Many of our deepest regrets come from realizing we spent too much on rewards that didn’t last.

Sky Treasure: Seeking What Is Highest

Jesus offers a radical alternative:

“Don’t store up for yourselves stored-wealth on the land, where moth and nibbler can ruin, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves stored-wealth in the sky, where neither moth nor nibbler can ruin, and where thieves can’t break in and steal.”

The BibleProject interprets this teaching with the phrase “sky treasure”—not as a direct translation, but as a concept that captures Jesus’ invitation to pursue the highest, most lasting rewards. In ancient cosmology, the sky represented what was highest, most enduring, and closest to the divine. Jesus is saying: Seek what is highest. Invest your resources in values and rewards that last—the ultimate "imports from abroad."

Things that last should come first.

This principle can guide every decision about what we import into our hearts. If a reward is fleeting, it shouldn’t get the best of our time, money, energy, or attention. If a reward lasts—if it aligns with love, justice, mercy, faith, and purpose—then it’s worth the cost.

Practical Application: Guarding the Port

Consider the ancient proverb:

“Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”

This wisdom is a call to set up “import policies” for our hearts—deciding in advance which values, desires, and influences are allowed to enter the port. The port of our heart has limited capacity, and wise customs policies are essential for ensuring only "expensive and valuable imports" gain entry.

Practical Steps:

• Customs Checklist: Before allowing a new value, commitment, or influence in, ask: Is this truly an expensive and valuable import, worthy of being brought in "from abroad"? Is it worth the cost in time, money, energy, or attention?

• Import Policies: Write down your highest values—your “sky treasure”—and use them as a rubric for what gets through the port. These are the "imports from abroad" that build a life of lasting significance.

• Regular Audits: Schedule weekly or monthly reflection times to review what you’ve let into your heart. Are your Four Core resources being spent on what is truly important? Is there “contraband” that needs to be sent back out?

• Port Security: Set boundaries to protect your heart from cheap imports—media, relationships, habits, or distractions that don’t align with your highest aims.

Maintaining the Value of What’s Imported

Just as imported treasures can lose value if neglected, the values we carry into our hearts need ongoing investment. Continue to “give” your Four Core resources—time, money, energy, and attention—on what matters most. Protect these treasures from being diluted by lesser priorities, and regularly renew your commitment to them.

In Summary

The heart is the port of our lives—the center where our deepest desires, highest aims, and most important values are stored. What we make important is what we are willing to pay the highest price to import, using the Four Core currencies of life: time, money, energy, and attention. The ancient wisdom to “guard your heart” is a call to set wise policies, invest our resources intentionally, and ensure only the most expensive and valuable imports—our “sky treasure,” brought in "from abroad"—are allowed in.

Limits are not constraints to be resented, but the very thing that gives our choices—and thus our lives—meaning and value.

If it’s an expensive and valuable import, it’s important. Guard your port accordingly. Things that last should come first.